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GreenTech Media recently showed that the main energy statistics agency for the United States, the Energy Information Agency (EIA) was missing information on a whopping 45 percent of installed solar PV. The problem is with their methodology – they don’t count customer-sited solar, like systems on rooftops. GreenTech found that actual solar production was 50 percent higher than official estimates. Three states (CA, AZ, HI) now get more than 5 percent of their electricity from solar, something you wouldn’t know if you only consulted EIA.

EIA data says that Minnesota produced no electricity from solar in 2012, and 2.7 gigawatt hours in 2013. Here is the chart from their Electricity Browser:

In reality, Minnesota produced something like 18.7 gigawatt hours from solar PV in 2013, or 592 percent more than EIA estimates.

I didn’t just use wikipedia data to make this estimate, I used data from the Minnesota Department of Commerce’s Annual Distributed Generation Interconnection Report, which utilities are required to submit each year showing existing and new DG facilities. The number above comes from only six utilities in Minnesota, which I think are some of the largest in terms of number of customers.

Here is the breakdown of installed capacity at the six utilities:

I couldn’t find a report on total installed PV capacity or production on Commerce’s website, but it could be hidden in dockets somewhere.

If you’re looking for accurate data on the growth of distributed generation, like solar, you can’t (yet) count on EIA. GreenTech outlines a bunch of reasons why this is important, including making the EPA’s Clean Power Plan to regulate existing power plants look harder to accomplish than it might be.

In Minnesota, solar is a small (0.04% of total generation in 2014), but growing part of the energy mix. Accurately tracking this growth is important for making good policy, especially in regards to distributed (customer-owned) generation, which is usually outside the control of utility planning processes.

Xcel Energy, the state’s largest electric utility, has filed their 2016-2030 Resource Plan with the Public Utilities Commission. This begins a long process of commenting and modification until their plan is approved by that body (which can take years). The Resource Plan details what trends in usage Xcel expects, and what resources (like new power plants, etc) are needed to meet that demand. The plan is important because it identifies the infrastructure investments the utility will need to make, and also the resulting environmental performance, among many other details.

I’m slowly making my way through it, both for professional and personal interest, and hope to highlight some thoughts for you, my dozens of readers.

There are a lot of things to like in the plan, the first being that Xcel is planning to meet State greenhouse gas emissions reduction goals within their own system. This is unlike the previous plan, which showed emissions increasing between 2015 and 2030. The chart below, from Appendix D, compares the two plans. (State goals include a reduction of 15 percent by 2015, 30 percent by 2025 and 80 percent by 2050)

Most of the planned reductions in carbon pollution come from the addition of renewable energy resources to their system, as the chart below shows. By 2030, Xcel plans for 35 percent of their energy portfolio to be renewables.

However, I think the plan’s assumptions about the future cost of the solar portion of those renewables is probably too high.

Xcel plans to add over 1,800 MW of utility-scale solar to their system by 2030 (up from basically zero in 2015). This is a significant increase from the “reference case”, a ten-fold increase in fact. However, this slide was presented at a public meeting at the Public Utilities Commission:

As solar technology is still not fully mature, and costs are expected to decline and conversion efficiency to improve, it was assumed that the $95/MWh price holds throughout the study period. In effect, the assumption is that fundamental cost driver improvements will offset inflation.

So the rate of decrease in solar prices will match the inflation rate? Many sources have documented the dramatic decline in solar PV prices over recent years. Lazard seems to be an oft-cited source, and their 2014 Levelized Cost of Energy Analysis shows the price of energy from solar has dropped 78% since 2009. According to usinflationcalculator.com, the cumulative rate of inflation between 2009 and 2014 was about 10%. So, at least looking historically, this seems way off.

Of course, current precipitous declines probably won’t continue forever (most of the cost is now not modules). NREL says costs have been dropping on average 6 to 8 percent per year since 1998. If we assume just half of that decline per year (4 percent), solar energy would be around $51 per MWh in 2030. Using some very back-of-envelope calculations, a price difference of $46 per MWh in 2030 means costs for new solar energy shown in the Plan’s “Preferred Plan” scenario could be over-estimated by $97 million.

This is significant not just because the price estimates of the Preferred Plan may be too high. In preparing the plan, Xcel also ran seemingly dozens of other scenarios, some including CO2 reductions of over 50% in 2030 (compared with 2005). The price difference, according to Xcel, between the Preferred Plan scenario and the scenario with the largest CO2 benefit is $172 million (from Appendix J). These other scenarios which seem too costly may actually be more in line with what Xcel is currently asking to spend once dropping technology costs are factored in.

In an area that has seen its fair share of roadwork during the past few years, city officials want to raise West Avenue between 1½ to 2 feet during the next few years in an effort to prepare one of the lowest-lying points of Miami Beach for anticipated sea level rise.

Raising the road would be tied to stormwater drainage and sewer improvements that include installing more pumps to prevent flooding from rain and high tides. The first phase, which will likely begin in February, involves work on West Avenue from Fifth to Eighth streets and from Lincoln Road to 17th Street. This phase would last until August.

The West Avenue Neighborhood Association met Wednesday night with city officials to discuss the plans. Public Works director Eric Carpenter told the packed room of about 100 residents — some skeptical and some more in favor of the plan — that he prefers dovetailing the street raising with the underground infrastructure work rather than tearing up the street several times.

“It doesn’t really make any sense to disturb those segments of the street twice,” he said. “We’re moving forward with the stormwater improvements. What we’re trying to do now is get a consensus from the community that we want to move forward with everything else on that street so that we don’t have to come back later and tear it up again.”

With a higher road, the city would create transitions from the road to the sidewalk that include, depending on the property, a higher sidewalk, steps down to the sidewalk and/or extra drainage components to ensure that no water from the street is draining onto private property.

The first phase of the project will cost $15 million. A few reflections on this:

What about the buildings?

Local government officials would have a much steeper political hill to climb to spend $15 million on climate mitigation (emissions reduction) work.

I predict the costs of (attempting to) adapt to climate change will mostly be borne locally, be largely uncounted at the macro scale (and thus make mitigation seem expensive in comparison), and will often turn out to be a waste of money (since they won’t work for very long). I hope I’m wrong.

My latest at streets.mn does the carbon accounting which should have been part of the Draft 2040 Transportation Policy Plan developed by the Met Council.

Thrive MSP 2040, the new regional plan for the 7-county metro adopted by the Metropolitan Council, includes moderately strong language about addressing climate change. But the main implementation tool we’ve seen so far from the Council, the Draft 2040 Transportation Policy Plan, doesn’t go nearly far enough. In fact, it doesn’t even start where it should, with a baseline of emissions.

In this and future posts, I’ll try to do what I think the Draft Transportation Policy Plan should have done – identify where we’re starting from and where we need to go in terms of transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions.

The Metropolitan Council held a public hearing tonight on their draft Transportation Policy Plan. If you care about transit or transportation issues in the region, you should comment (you can do so through October 1). Here are four comments I have on the plan:

Our urban areas are significantly underserved by this plan. Even under the “increased revenue scenario”, we will spend $5 on transit to serve suburban commuters for every $1 we spend on transit improvements to places where transit makes economic sense (see here for my attempt at a geographic breakdown of projects). The Met Council, in the Thrive 2040 plan, has said they want to match transit service to the number of riders and intensity of land use. This plan does not do that.

The plan currently prioritizes projects like Gateway BRT (9,000 riders at $50,000 per rider) over projects like Hennepin Ave BRT (23,000 riders at $896 per rider). This is an example of how our urban areas (that are expected to grow significantly) are underrepresented in this plan.

It’s definitely not all bad. The Met Council for the first time has identified regional priorities for a bicycle network, which will give communities the ability to apply for funds to upgrade their local network if it matches the regional plan. Many of the transit projects identified are much needed improvements (Hennepin, Chicago, West Broadway), but are simply not adequately prioritized.

Solar PV seems to be the current darling of the renewable energy world. But how much “resource” is really out there? How much should cities rely on the development of local solar resources to meet their climate and energy goals? What trade-offs should urban cities make between desirable things like tree canopy and maximizing solar energy resources? GIS tools and new data resources can help begin to answer that question.

Counties and states are beginning to produce LiDAR data more regularly, which provides the building block information needed to analyze solar resources on buildings and elsewhere (see my previous post for a brief intro to LiDAR, or see here). Minnesota happens to have LiDAR for the whole state, and Minneapolis has a climate action goal that references local renewable development, so I’ll focus there.

So how much solar electric potential does Minneapolis have? Enough to supply 773,000 megawatt-hours (MWHs) each year, at the upper bound. That would mean covering every piece of rooftop with good sun exposure and appropriate pitch (southeast to southwest facing or flat) with the best modern PV panels. It would also mean solar installations on 68,351 structures, consisting of over 2.3 million individual panels. Continue reading →

Our region certainly can’t address this issue alone, but we have a responsibility to do our part. The science also says we can’t wait another ten years to start addressing the problem. However, as this plan is currently written, the specifics on climate response are too ambiguous, and risk being watered down during implementation.The regional plan is one of the state’s most significant pieces of land use and transportation policy. By fully embracing state goals and calling for strong response, this could be a document that makes Minnesota a national leader in climate change response.

Old news, but still worth posting. In October, Xcel Energy filed a report with the Public Utilities Commission defending the cost overruns of upgrading the nuclear power plant in Monticello. Via the Star Tribune:

Xcel filed the report in response to the state Public Utilities Commission’s pledge in August to investigate the Monticello investment. The company said that even with the cost overruns, the project benefits customers — saving an estimated $174 million through the remaining 16 years of its license.

Yet that cost-benefit number relies on a “social cost” comparison between keeping the nuclear plant, which emits no greenhouse gases, vs. generating electricity from a plant that does emit them. State law says utility regulators should consider the cost of greenhouse gas emissions, though they’re not currently regulated. Without carbon-emissions savings, the Monticello upgrade would be a losing proposition, costing customers $303 million extra over its life, according to Xcel’s filing.

In interviews, Xcel executives defended the investment, saying they would make the same decision today, even though the utility world has changed since 2008, when the project began. Natural gas, now a favored fuel for power plants, is low-priced thanks to the fracking boom. And electricity demand has lagged since the recession, dampening the need for new plants.

“If we didn’t have our nuclear plants, we would be taking a big step backward in terms of our CO2 accomplishments,” said Laura McCarten, an Xcel regional vice president.

If you dig into the dockets (CI-13-754), you can find that Xcel’s modeling assumptions include a price on carbon of $21.50 per metric ton starting in 2017.

Regardless of your feelings about nuclear power, a utility stating that the externalities of carbon should be priced when making energy planning/financing decisions is significant. The use of a ‘social cost of carbon’ (SCC) metric at the federal level has (not shockingly) been the point of some contention. The Office of Management and Budget’s SCC is $35/mt in 2015 versus Xcel’s $21 in 2017.

Theoretically, we should start to see this figure or something similar used in all future energy planning decisions (Sherco, cough, cough) in Minnesota. Unless of course, Xcel was only being selective in order to justify recovering this very large expense (and spare the shareholders).

It would be an interesting exercise to apply this Minnesota SCC to land use and transportation infrastructure and planning decisions.